de
along the familiar road. Lewis belonged to a Virginia regiment, and
had known both Mercer and Talbot well, and in fact all the officers who
had been killed. The officers of that little army were like a band of
brothers, and after every battle there was a general mourning for the
loss of many friends. The casualties among the officers in the sharp
engagement had been unusually severe, and entirely disproportioned to
the total loss; the bulk of the loss had fallen upon Mercer's brigade.

They found the general in Clark's farmhouse, near the field of battle,
lingering in great pain, and slowly dying from a number of ferocious
bayonet wounds. He was attended by his aid, Major Armstrong, and the
celebrated Dr. Benjamin Rush came especially from Philadelphia to give
the dying hero the benefit of his skill and services. He had been
treated with the greatest respect by the enemy, for Cornwallis was
always quick to recognize and respect a gallant soldier. The kindly
Quakers had spared neither time nor trouble to lighten his dying hours,
and the women of the household nursed him with gentle and assiduous
care. He passed away ten days after the battle, leaving to his
descendants the untarnished name of a gallant soldier and gentleman,
who never faltered in the pursuit of his high ideals of duty. Brief as
had been his career as a general in the Revolution, his memory is still
cherished by a grateful posterity, as one of the first heroes of that
mighty struggle for liberty.

Details of the British were already marching toward the field of action
to engage in the melancholy work of burying the dead, when Seymour,
under Major Armstrong's guidance, went over the ground in a search for
Talbot. He had no difficulty in finding the place where his friend had
fallen. The field had not been disturbed by any one. A bloody frozen
mass of ice and snow had shown where Mercer had fallen, and across the
place where his feet had been lay the body of Talbot. In front of him
lay the lieutenant with whom he had fought, the sword still buried in
his breast; farther away were the two men that the general and he had
cut down in the first onslaught, and at his feet was the corpse of the
man he had last shot, his stiffened hands still tightly clasping his
gun. Around on the field were the bodies of many others who had
fallen. Some of the Americans had been literally pinned to the earth
by the fierce bayonet thrusts they had received in th